Category: News

The Shearwater Sailing Club AGM will be held on 6 December at 730pm in the Clubhouse.
The agenda is attached and also the minutes of the previous meeting and proposed revisions to the club constitution.
This is an opportunity for members to have their say about the club and to have first pick of dates for next year’s duties. Please come along, it is not usually a long meeting and we need a good, high turnout to vote on the constitutional changes.

Well that’s the summer over for another year; but I do hope yours has been a successful one and that you have had the chance to get down to the lake and enjoy your sailing. This years’ summer racing has been very well supported with a reasonable size fleet out on both a Sunday and Tuesday evenings and we started the Autumn season with a fantastic days racing against Bristol Avon Sailing Club for the Gilmer Trophy. We had 20 boats on the water, with a very brisk westerly and strong gusts coming from all over the place as is the norm at Shearwater. Check out the excellent photos on our Facebook page.

If you haven’t managed to get down to the lake much this summer don’t worry as there are still 9 race days left followed by the last thrash on Sunday 26 November; the best winds are often in the Autumn as we get the remnants of the hurricane season drifting across the Atlantic on the jet stream.

Although we have not yet had to cancel a race we are still struggling at times to find duty personnel and I would like to extend a big vote of thanks to those committee members who have stepped up to the plate at the last minute to ensure that the race goes on! If you are new to the club and not sure what the duty entails then feel free to pop into the race box on any Sunday and watch how easy it is to run our races. I know not all members race, but without the races the club would not exist so you are still under obligation to help keep the race fixtures list as active as possible by doing you fair share of the duties.

I would also like to thank the small group of volunteers that have been down to the clubhouse on a regular basis to clean it now that we no longer have a paid cleaner; I am sure you will all agree that they are doing an excellent job. With this in mind please do remember to clean up after yourselves if you use the clubhouse, especially in the kitchen area.

There are two important dates for your diary on the horizon, the first is The Annual Dinner and Prize Giving. This will be held on Friday 24 November at The Royal Oak, Corsley. It is a fairly informal occasion with excellent food and drink and it will give you lots of opportunity to recall those successes you have had throughout this season, and maybe get a tip or two out of the more seasoned members as to how to use the notoriously fickle Shearwater winds to your best advantage next year! Sandy Lavelle has kindly volunteered to co-ordinate this years event (ably assisted by Pat I have no doubt) and the menu choices should be appearing on the web site soon. Guests of members are welcome and it will be on a first come basis so book your place with Sandy early as unfortunately there is not the room for everyone to attend.

Second important date for your diary is the Annual General Meeting; this will be held on Wed 6 December at the clubhouse and it would be nice to see as many members as possible; we do need at least 20 if we are to change anything! I assure you that this meeting will not drag on as the agenda is tightly controlled, but it is your chance to influence how the club is run. If you have any items/issues that you wish to be on the agenda then please let me, or the club secretary know by Sunday 8 October as this gives the committee a chance to discuss the item/issue and present suitable proposals to the AGM. As always there are vacancies on the Committee to be filled so if anyone wishes to serve on the Committee please let the club secretary know, and that includes my post (commodore) which has historically changed annually.

Hi All,
Just a reminder that there are still some outstanding duties that need filling to take us to the end of the season.
Please take a look and make a note , check your diaries, and let me know you can do one of these.
There are still some members that have only done one or no duties, so it would be greatly appreciated if you could do the following dates : Rescue boat 10/9/17 urgent
OOD 17/9/17
AOOD 24/9/17
AOOD 1/10/17
AOOD 15/10/17
Rescue Boat 5/11/17
Please email and let me know if you can help. See you on the water.
Regards
Juley Simmonds
Duties Officer